Lettice Digby, Lady Offaley

The
Lady Lettice Digby is a heroine whose name right well deserves to be held
in remembrance along with those of Lady Brilliana Harley, of Blanche Lady
Arundell, and of the Lady of Lathom, whose defenses of Wardour Castle and
Lathom House I have told in previous papers.* Her defense of Geashill
Castle, in King's County, Ireland, was one of the most spirited episodes
in the history of the Irish Rebellion in 1641. She was by birth Lettice,
FitzGerald, being the only child of Gerald, Lord Offaley, whose
great-grandfather, Gerald, ninth earl of Kildare, was an ancestor of the
ducal house of Leinster. Her mother, the Lady Katherine Knollys, a cousin
of Queen Elizabeth, was left a widow almost at her birth, in 1580.The earldom, of course,
descended in the male line, but the barony of Offaley, as a barony in fee,
was one which it was thought could pass to females, and was therefore
claimed for the youthful heiress while still a child. But the claim,
though brought before the judges, was kept so long in dispute that King
James I. undertook to adjudicate it in person, and in the end he did so,
being probably moved by gifts and presents, which in his day often helped
to promote or to defeat justice. His Majesty in the end adjudged the
ancient barony to the earl, but created Lettice Knollys Baroness Offaley
for life. The King's grant, which is dated in 1619, and was made under the
great Seal of England, invested her with the lands of Killeagh and the
territory and demesne of Geashill, which she brought by marriage into the
Digby family.
When the Irish rebellion of 1641 broke out, as mentioned above, the
Lady Offaley was some sixty years of age, and had been a widow for a
quarter of a century. ‘With the rebels she could make no common cause,
and with the defection of the Lords of the Pale she could have no
sympathy;' she was therefore prepared to resist every challenge and every
overture on the part of the insurgents, whose action she regarded as foul
disloyalty. Her ladyship was residing at Geashill with her sons and some
of her grandchildren, when the forces of the enemy appeared before the
walls of her castle, in spite of the natural defenses of the bogs by which
the place was surrounded. Henry Demsey a brother of Lord Clanmalier, and
her own kinsman, along with others of the leaders of the rebels, sent her
a summons which purported to be in the king's name, ordering her at once
to surrender her fortress, and at the same time threatening, in case of
non-compliance, to burn it and the town which lay clustered at the foot of
its walls, but promising her and her people a safe convoy in case she
should yield.
This missive was addressed to 'the honorable and thrice virtuous
lady, the Lady Digby.' But, aware of the men with whom she had to deal,
Lady Digby was not to be dismayed by threats or duped by promises. Castle
after castle had yielded, some gained over by threats, some by siege, and
some by storm, and theirhelpless inmates had
been butchered or driven forth homeless and shelterless. The Lady Lettice
had too much spirit to yield herself to such a fate without a struggle, or
without fighting a blow in self-defense. She alike questioned the
authority of her enemies and distrusted their promises of mercy.
‘I am,' she replied, ‘as I have ever been, a loyal subject of my
king. I thank you for your offer of a convoy, which, however, I hold as of
little safety. Being free from offending His Majesty, or doing wrong to
any of you, I will live and die innocently, and will do my best to defend
my own, leaving the issue to God.' Such was this noble lady's dauntless
answer to a summons sent fraudulently in the king's name, requiring her to
give up her castle to her own and the king's enemies.
Being surrounded by extensive bogs, Geashill Castle was by no means
easy of approach, as already mentioned; but in proportion to its strength
was its possession of importance to the rebels. ‘Gesshall, in the King's
County, is very necessaire to be had; it is a matter of consequence to Her
Majesties service in thatcounty were the words
of Sir Henry Sidney, when he paid a visit to Ireland in the previous reign
of Elizabeth. Sixty years later it was equally, valuable prize, and the
rebels determined to secure it if they could, at all cost.
Negotiations with its high-spirited owner being useless, they
proceeded to make an assault on the castle; but they experienced such a
warm reception on a near approach, that they were glad to retreat. ' One
of the Lady Offaley's sons, having fallen into the hands of the rebels,
was brought under the castle walls in chains, and a threat was held out
that, unless she made at once an unconditional surrender they would strike
his head off before her eyes. Nothing daunted, she replied that she had a
Roman Catholic priest as a prisoner within her walls, that she would bring
him out upon the ramparts, and that his life should be immediately
forfeited if the rebels touched a hair of her son's head. As the rebels
were Catholics, reverence for their priest induced them to withdraw as the
price of his safety.
The siege was, however, renewed after a brief interval, and prisoners
were taken on either side. On one occasion a messenger, sent by Lady
Offaley with a letter to the rebels, was detained by them. ‘ I am
innocent,' she wrote, ‘of doing you any injury, unless you count it an
injury for my people to bring back a small quantity of my own woods when
they find them, and with them some men who have done me all the ill they
can devise.'
The siege was suspended for a time, but not abandoned, an interval of
two months being spent in making preparations for a renewed assault. A
hundred and forty fragments of old iron were collected from every quarter,
and brought together, and an Irish rebel undertook the work of fixing
them, and molding them into one huge cannon. Three times were they recast
before the work was completed, but the lady of Geashill showed no signs of
alarm. At length the engine was brought across the bogs to the front of
the castle. Hoping to intimidate its gallant defender, Lord Clanmalier
himself wrote to her announcing the arrival of this formidable piece of
ordnance, telling her that he would never leave the spot to which he bad
advanced, until he had gained possession of the castle. Her answer was
characteristic of womanly bravery: ‘ I am still of the same mind, my lord,
and I can think no place safer than my own house; God will, I trust, take
a poor widow into His protection, and defend her from all those who
without cause have risen up against her.'
Her confidence was not vain. Clanmalier ordered the cannon to be
placed in the most commanding position, but it burst on its first
discharge, injuring several of his rebel forces. The rest, in bitter
disappointment, took up their guns, and kept up a continuous fire of
musketry until the evening, but without inflicting any real damage. Lady
Offaley herself watched the attempted assault from the window. As soon as
night set in, the insurgents made off, carrying with them their unlucky
cannon.
But the respite which they allowed the lady was a brief one. Next
morning Lady Offaley received the following letter from her rebel cousin,
Lord Clanmalier:
‘ Madame---I received your letter, and am still tender of your good and
welfare, though you give no credit thereunto. And, whereas you do not
understand by relation that my piece of ordnance did not prosper, I
believe you will be sensible of the hazard and loss you are like to
sustain thereby, unless you be better advised to accept of the kind offer
which I mentioned to you in my last letter unto you . . . If not, expect
no further favor at my hands.---And so I rest, your ladyship's loving
cousin, &c.’
The fawning hypocrisy of her foe was well met by the keen and caustic
reply of Lady Offaley:
‘My Lord,---Your second summons I have received, and shall be glad to
find you tender of my good. For your piece of ordnance I never disputed
how it prospered, presuming you would rather make use of it for your own
defense or against your enemies than against a poor widow of your own
blood, which, if shed, shall be required at the hands of those that seek
to spill it. For my part, my conscience tells me that I am innocent, and I
wish you so too.---I rest, your cousin, &c.’
In this letter true womanly feeling and thorough heroism are apparent
in closest alliance. Lady Lettice was not ashamed of pleading her
womanhood and her widowhood. Her mind was free from arrogance and pride;
she uttered no hard words; she was cautious as well as courageous. When
her danger became more imminent, and her resources grew feebler, she felt
that help from outside was not to be rejected. At the end of April, 1642,
she succeeded in informing Sir Charles Coote who was then at Naas, in the
county of Kildare, of the straits to which she was reduced. He applied at
once to the Earl of Ormond, who was at Dublin, for instructions, and the
matter was laid before the council at Dublin Castle. It was determined
that no time should be lost in sending assistance to Geashill.
Accordingly, Philip Sydney, Lord de Lisle, son of the Lord-Lieutenant of
Ireland, was sent to the King's County, with a regiment of carabineers and
a company of dragoons, which he had brought with him from England. He was
placed in this high command in spite of his youth; but ' he would have
belied the high name which he bore, had he not been forward to render
assistance where such claims of chivalry and humanity were put forth as at
Geashill.' Accompanied by Sir George Wentworth, Sir Charles Coote, and
Lord Digby, the Lady Lettice's eldest son, he set off at once, and at the
head of three hundred horse, and half that number of foot-soldiers. But
their active aid was scarcely needed, for, though they were slightly
harassed by some rebel skirmishers as they crossed the bog, yet on
reaching Geashill it was found that the rebels had gone off into the woods
and the mountains. It appeared that Lady Offaley, weary of waiting for
help, or, at all events, unaware that it was close at hand, had despatched
messengers to some of her relatives among the FitzGeralds, asking for the
loan of about fifty foot-soldiers to protect her against the ‘mixed
multitude' of insurgents. This latter, however, fell into the hands of her
foes, who were on the point of returning to renew the siege, when the
sudden arrival of the royal troops scattered them one and all to the
winds.Although repeatedly urged by
her friends to retire to some place of peace and safety, this heroic lady
preferred to remain within her own castle walls, which were now
well-provided from Dublin with arms and ammunition. Having spent some
months in peace and quiet, and having seen the last of the rebels in her
own neighborhood, Lady Lettice was at last persuaded to quit the fortress
which she had so gallantly defended, and to settle down in England for the
remainder of her days. She therefore retired to her husband's estate at
Coleshill, in Warwickshire, where she died December 1, 1658, and she lies
buried by his side in the parish church of that pleasant country town.

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